Year Naming

I have spent the past year running.  Well, maybe not the entire year, but the better part of it.  Actually, I've done it nearly all my life.  When life gets tough and decisions don't come easy, and emotions battle against reason and I just don't wanna anymore, I run.  I hide.  I ignore.

I ignore my house.  The dust, the sticky floors, the piles, the meals.
I ignore my people, big and small.
I ignore that small voice that says, come away with me.

I stick my head in the sand of the internet, or the sewing machine, or a novel and I disappear from now. 

Running is my favorite dysfunctional behavior.  But this year, 2011, will be different.  Not because I say it will be (human effort accomplishes nothing), but because I feel God putting his finger on this area, and when God puts his finger on something in me, it changes.  I love that he comes for me.  I love that he doesn't leave me alone, to build this building all by myself.  I love that he comes for me.

I've already started 'cleaning house' by deleting bookmarked blogs that drag me away from home and I've replaced them with ones that speak words that make my soul strong.  Words that make me want to be home.  To be here.

I'm a homemaker.

I just am.  I don't want to 'go to work', or go to school.  I want to be home.  But this year I have fought that because I've felt outmatched.  Outdone.  Unfit for the battle.  Beat.

I've felt that it was altogether too much.  This battle, this lot... It was too big, and I, too little.

A few nights ago as I lay in bed ready for sleep, I thought of my life and of the so many things I feel I can't lay hold of... that my life is pulling away from me, and I can't keep up with the pace of it.  And then I saw myself swimming in open water; my life, all these things, a motor-powered vessel, pulling farther and farther ahead of me, widening the gap between us.

What a sinking feeling.

Life is hard, and it's fast, but part of my problem (if not all of it) is me.  (It nearly always is.)  My unwillingness to turn and face it, my turning away in hopes it'll all clear up while my back does all the talking, poor attitude, poor time management.  Feeding on junk food when there's wholeness to be had. Preferring the junk.

One of the new authors I've bookmarked has got me thinking (she always does).  Ann names her years, and this year, I'm doing that, too.  So much good comes from purposed living.  This year I'm following Ann's lead, and like her, I'm naming my year the Year of Here.

Aside: Ann's writing is brilliant.  Brilliant.  

When I read something good, and striking, 

I want to write it down.  (I usually do exactly that.) 

I want to write down her entire posts.  

They're that good.

It's gonna be a good year. 

Simple.  Trimmed down.  Purposed.  Here.  I've missed so much, and regret is corrosive.  I don't like the taste of it.  Pass me the present.

The foolish man seeks happiness in the distance; 

the wise grows it under his feet. 

James Openheim

What'll you name your year?